2014.05.01 - The List: Retrival
Small fires flickered for several minutes along the underground corridors leading up to the room where the Hellfire Club keeps its membership list; most marked the bodies of fallen Hellfire Knights, while others just worked their way along the odd piece of flammable decoration. The thick steel wall separating the corridors from the chamber - a security measure enacted when the chamber was breached during a gala - was melted nearly in half by what(whom)ever set the fires down there, leaving a horsehoe-shaped hole whose borders glowed red hot for some time after the fires guttered out; the book within is gone, snatched and spirited away mere moments after the Lord Imperial left it. All in all, it was something of a mess, and it was one that Xavin had no intention of sticking around to clean up. After triggering her signal beacon, she ran with the book in her invisible clutches, waiting out or just dodging past security forces as need be. Finding a way out of the sprawling estate was a time-consuming affair, but she suspected that her superior officer was unlikely to teleport directly onto the site of her undercover mission to extract her unless it was an emergency; it was as good an opportunity as any to practice her stealth drills. Some hours after the operation, the skrull is sitting at the outer edge a window-adjacent booth in a small diner in Queens, and the book is sittinginvisibly beside her; the sign out front just says 'DINER', a sure sign of class. There are only three other booths and a few stools lined up along a counter a few feet away; none of the other seats are taken right now. Her middle-aged sommelier disguise is gone in favor of youthful features, brown skin, and shoulder-length black hair pulled back into a tight ponytail; she's wearing a purple and black Gotham Knights jersey with blue jeans. It's been about half an hour since she arrived, enough time to order herself a few glasses of water, but not, apparently, enough to order; there's still an unopened menu sitting near the edge of the table. She's waiting for a friend, she told the waitress, mostly because 'I don't have any money, but I'd like a glass of water' tends not to work so well. Her posture's been impeccably straight for all of that time - just in case Cable shows up unexpectedly - but that hasn't kept her fingertips from tapping out soft, idle cadences against the table as she keeps watch over the street outside. The little bell at the dinner door rang as a new customer arrived. It had been a few hours and in those few hours, Sebastian Shaw had changed out of his Hellfire Club regalia and into a more normal dark blue suit with a white ascot. He smiled at the server behind the counter and put a few hundred dollars on the counter, "Right now you're closed and you are not here. Do we understand each other?" The server counted the money and looked at the near empty diner and nodded. She then ran towards the door and flipped the sign on the door so it said closed. Sebastian Shaw looked towards the only other patron of this delightful little diner and walked towards them, "I have to admit, you are a hard person to find. But not impossible." Xavin hadn't expected to have the diner to herself all night; late as it is, there are still enough people out and about that she was prepared for the possibility of she and Cable having to share the space. If it came down to it, they could always speak without words, and the book would be safe from prying eyes until they retreated to somewhere more private; simple enough. Unfortunately, she wasn't exactly expecting the first person through the door to be Shaw, either; her eyes widen when she first spots him, only to be turned down to the table once the initial shock fades. Maybe it's a coincidence. Maybe rich humans crave unhealthy food after a night of drinking like other humans do; maybe the waitress is secretly his mistress. All the same, Xavin is holding the heel of her palm firmly against her hip as that bell sounds, triggering the disc-shaped beacon hidden in her pocket. Just in case. As he approaches her, she brings her hand up so that both can be cupped loosely around her drink. "Wha--?" she vocalizes, squinting up at the man with a bewildered expression. "Who--" Her eyes dart around the empty dinner surrounding them, and then as she tightens her hands around the glass and leans slightly away from Shaw, she refocuses her narrowed gaze on him and finishes, "Did my mom send--no, look, you know what? It doesn't matter, it--look, it's not even a school night, alright? I'm, like, an adult now, and it's Saturday, and you can go back to my mom and tell her to eff off because I am not going home until I am good and ready to go home." Sebastian Shaw shook his head as he approached the 'teenage girl,' "I am Sebastian Shaw, child. I rule this world by proxy. Do not treat me like I am a fool." He casually sat down in front of Xavin at the booth and said, "You've been telepathically tracked since you left my Club, child. Outside are ten men who would like nothing more than to shoot you full of little burning holes with their laser rifles. I generally abhor violence but I do want to give them what they want. I am a man of the people after all." He steepled his fingers and set his elbows on the table of the booth, "But if you give me what I want, that won't be necessary. You have my property, I want my property back. It's as simple as that." One beep was fine. Cable happened to be quite busy at the time, and he anticipated that if things were not a true emergency, Xavin could be trusted to handle it. Recovery of the list was certainly a priority, but an escape is an escape. The longer that the skrull has to escape and blend in, the more reliable it will be to meet them without drawing undue attention. That is, until Professor states simply. "Xavin is sending an immediate emergency signal." "Armory." Cable states. A rack of weapons springs up. Two plasma pistols are holstered on either shoulder, before slinging a heavy blaster across his back. A nest of grenades follow, attached to a hip. "...Bodyslide by one." Shaw might be a man who is meticulous and plans everything, but what happens next one would be hard pressed to foresee without true prophecy. There's a roar of blue temporal energy that shakes the windows, as the massive form of Cable appears mid-air only a meter away from Shaw. His trenchcoat whirls around, left eye glowing orange. There's no chance that the Hellfire Club doesn't know this man. However, the files and information indicate he is an Omega psionic crippled by a virus, and forced to rely on physical combat and an array of high-tech weaponry. And Nathan Dayspring has been *very* careful about ensuring that has remained the global rumor. "...Shaw." he states, landing heavily on the tile floor. "I'm not surprised someone like you is in the Club. Are you just a dog, then?" "Yeah? All I see's some old white guy," Xavin shoots back as she flicks her eyes to the window. The glowering girl doesn't make any move to stop Shaw or vacate the booth, instead trusting that Cable will come as quickly as promised. Her posture is noticably stiff, though, even moreso than it was before he arrived; at this point, she's just trying to get under his skin and buy time for Cable, so the possibility that she might have to contend with a bunch of laser rifles should Shaw get impatient is lingering in her thoughts. "I don't know what you want, I don't have what you want, and if I did, I probably wouldn't give it to you--" Blue energies split the air in the diner, rattling the windows and putting an abrupt end to Xavin's sass; despite shielding her eyes against the rift's glare, the skrull allows herself to exhale in momentary relief as Cable emerges from it. When she's given orders, she complies by fading from view without another word. A slight flick of her wrist summons an invisible bubble around the book so that it can float near her as she slides from the booth to take up a position behind the psychic. |"In position,"| she thinks as a number of floating daggers manifest around the two of them, |"and ready to support you."| "Ah, you must be Cable. I didn't realize you were working for the Great Imperator as well," Sebastian said, not moving at all from his seat in the dinner's booth. He seemed rather... non-pulsed by the whole sudden appearance actually. At Cable's comment about him though he couldn't help but chuckle a bit, "Please, I'm no one's dog, sir. Though I'm sure you'll take great pleasure in trying to figure out exactly what my role in all of this is." Sebastian Shaw's mind was mostly static right now if Cable tried to come in, he had no idea how Xavin had managed to allude him before so he came prepared: the telepathic scrambler in his inner jacket pocket had only about a half-hour of charge but that should be enough for now. He shook his head at all this naked display of power and bravado. He thought he was the over dramatic one, "Now then, there is no need for violence or showmanship. I want what belongs to the Hellfire Club. Once I have it back, you two can go back to practicing your posing in the mirror and I can go back to flirting with unbelievably attractive woman." "Erik? Hardly." Cable states, dismissively. A casual flicker finds that wall of static. Which interests him, more than anything else. Someone who knew nothing wouldn't have a piece of technology considered so valuable. It's meant to hold secrets, like the clasped cover of a book. "How about this?" is suddenly offered by Nathan. His hand raises, and there's a flash of telekinesis; blue energy moving to grip Shaw from head to toe, and immobilize him with nearly fifty tons of resistance. "I'm an independent operative. I work for me. And it just so happens... ...that your club is the kind of cancer I've sworn to remove." Obviously, this is going to trigger a response, if Shaw truly has anyone outside who's prepared to attack if needed. "I politely decline your offer of amnesty, Mr. Shaw." And with that, Cable would twist, intending to hurl Shaw through the wall of the diner adjacent; if successful, resulting in an explosion of glass, wood, and support beams, and sufficient to send him a couple dozen meters into the parking lot proper. |"Telepathy, he said,"| Xavin thinks as the knives fly up, gather above her, then flow togetether into a cascade of invisible force that eventually forms a protective bubble around her. If Shaw does go through the window, her eyes are definitely on him until he's outside, in case his men open fire; if not, she's just keeping an eye on the window. Frustration is evident in her thoughts; she was sure that she'd gone undetected at the Club, and she certainly didn't feel any intrusion, although that's clearly just a sign that she needs more practice in handling telepaths. |"I wasn't careful enough."| A beat passes as her eyes momentarily drift towards the sphere orbiting her, and then she tentatively adds, |"And I don't want to leave you alone with them; these aren't street criminals, sir. Can you send his book back to your base...? I don't want to leave it unguarded, either."| Shaw offers no resistance as Cable restrains him and then throws him through the wall. This was the sort of thing he had wanted earlier in the night when he almost faced the Cat. He stood to his feet and dusted himself off. Not even a little bit harmed by the crash, though his designer suit took some damage. Ah well, he could afford a new suit easily enough. He then touch his throat, whispering into the com device underneath his ascot, "I'm fine. Do not move in until I say to." He walked a few feet forward and said loud enough for the duo to here him, "I'm the type of cancer that you've sworn to eliminate? The one who politely asked for his property back. Are you sure the type of cancer you need to eliminate isn't actually people who attack others unprovoked and try to kill them by throwing them through walls." He continued to approach the whole in the side of the dinner. He was already converting the kinetic energy from the impact in to physical strength, he was already stronger than when this started, "Or is it you just really hate philanthropy that helps millions of people receive food, shelter, clothing, education. Or perhaps its the endangered species habitats that I help preserve that you hate? Am I getting close yet?" He gestures with one of his hands and that's when the Hellfire Knights move in. All dressed in full body armor and armed with advanced laser rifles. They move in, train their weapons on Xavin and Cable but don't fire. Not yet anyways, "I mean look at these lads here, if I didn't pay them a very generous salary, with benefits, they probably would be trekking through third world nations with some corrupt PMC, raping and pillaging any town unlucky enough to be worth some money to them. "Don't bore me with your public relation covers. I don't look at years. Or decades. Or even human lifetimes, Mr. Shaw. I look at the future of humanity and society. ...And if you wish to interfere with that, I don't care if you cure AIDs and rain food across all of Africa. This eye..." Cable reaches up and taps the cybernetic one, glowing orange. "...can see through it." "How nice of you. Instead, you have them working towards more malevolent ends. But I know a better way of settling this. I'll break you, shatter your scrambler, and rip the secrets out of your head... and if you're as benevolent as you say, I'll even give the Club a donation...!!" There's a whirl as a telekinetic sheath covers Cable. Moving with superhuman speed, using telekinesis rather than his muscles or nervous system to move, two plasma blasters are in each hand. In the space of an eyeblink, he fires each a dozen times, sweeping them forward across the assembled Hell Knights. Each condensed charge would vaporize a piece of steel into slag... a good test of the durability of Shaw's forces. |"Is he powered, or is it some kind of armor?"| Her eyes are already searching the industrialist's body for some sign of added bulk from body armor or the bulge of a protective gadget, just in case it's the latter; technology, at least, can potentially be neutralized with a few well-placed force fields, provided that she can locate it. At the same time, Cable's flurry of movement causes her to drop back a couple of paces from the mutant to ensure that he has all the room he needs to do what he must; she's just settling into position by the time the last shot is fired. |"And where is this scrambler?" Her feet slide apart as she drops into a defensive stance, both hands raised with her palms turned towards the bubble surrounding her.